The Blog!

How many have said that they want to do great things for God? How many of God’s people want to reach heights of celebrated opportunity and scale tremendous mountains of glory? Oh, I think I can safely say that there are many who fall into that category. One question:Are you willing to pay the price to get there? In the gospel of Mark, two disciples of Jesus laid claim to positions of prominence and requested that Jesus fulfill their desires. Let us listen in on the conversation found in Mark 10:35-40.James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came up to Jesus and said, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.”

“What do you want me to do for you?” Jesus asked.

They said to him, “Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.”

Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or to be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?”

There is a fable of a man who was told by God to push a mighty boulder.The man looked at the steep hill that stood before him and threw his weight against the stone. He struggled and tried and fought against that huge monolith, but to no avail.Day after grueling day, the man faithfully went to the stone and, with all his might, pushed against it.Despair began to set in.He feared that when God returned and did not find the boulder at the top, that the Almighty would be furious.Yet, tearfully he blistered his hands against that rock as he obeyed the command of God.God did return many months later and found the man tired and sorrowful.“Why, my child, are you in such despair?” God asked.The man replied, “Forgive me, Lord, for I have failed to move the stone even one inch up the hill.”God smiled and reached His hand to pick the man up from his despair.“My dear son, I did not ask you to push against this boulder that you should change it but that it should change you.”Perplexed the man hung his head, “I don’t understand, Lord.”God stood the man on his feet.“Look at yourself.See how strong you’ve become; see how faithful you have proved yourself.Your callused hands can now grasp difficulty without being harmed.Your legs are powerful and can carry you on the path of faith.Your arms are strong and can now lift others up.”The man, in humble understanding, smiled at how God had loved him.“Come, my child,” God said, “for you are now fit for service in the kingdom of heaven.”The faith and character that God will build in your life is of great worth in His sight. And the final product is simple: a mature, Christian life. The Father has purposed us to grow in Christ and as we persevere we walk along the path that will build His life in us. He will take us down the rough road of suffering until the life of His Son is formed in us. God is preparing each one of us on this path to maturity. Or, as James says, "Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness" (James 1:2-3 ESV).

That was the question I received from the pastor when I walked the isle at the church to confess my faith in Christ. I was three days old in my new-found faith and it seemed that all-of-a-sudden I had to "get a job" for Jesus. I remembered that I mumbled some potential directions for my life, but I was uncertain and too young in my faith for such a question.

Not too many months after that moment, I ultimately switched churches, was baptized in Christ, and began to discover that being a Christian was more about my relationship with Jesus than my "employment" for Him. Yet, I find, that many take their Christian faith and morph it into work rather than embrace as their life.

Let me explain what I mean...

Have you ever heard the phrase concerning your job, "Don't take your work home with you?" This is a very real and time-honored reality for those who have stressful jobs. They want to leave their work behind when they go home - and understandably so. Home should be that place where you find the rest and repose needed to recover from a hard-day's work. Home is a haven, a respite of love and peace, a place where you can shut out the rest of the world for a time and simply exist without the pressures of work. So most people don't take their work home.

But what about the Christian life? After more than two decades preaching and teaching God's word, I'm coming to discover that many people view their Christian life as a "job." That is, they go to church and get involved in some task. Perhaps they take on a project or do a ministry--but their work for the LORD is just that: work. And no one wants to take their work home with them! They got saved, got a job for Jesus, and that is the entirety of their Christian life.

Being busy, then, becomes the means by which the level of the Christian life is measured. There are workaholics, steady employees, part-time workers, temps, and the spiritually unemployed. I don't know if you see the proverbial "red flag" in this, but I do: BURNOUT! The Christian life becomes less and less about having a growing, vibrant and loving relationship with Jesus and it descends into the muddled tedium of having to do your job. Dull, lifeless, banality is the Christian life for some--but it's not meant to be that way!

Jesus said He came to give us life - and that, abundantly! John 10:10 reads, "The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly."

So, a simple question for you... Have you let your Christian faith become little more than your church job? You may be a pastor, Sunday school teacher, missionary, custodian, musician, etc., or maybe you're just one who attends on a regular basis - but there is little life in what you do. You go to church, do your part, and that's it.

If that's the case, I want to encourage you with the words of Jesus from Revelation 2:4-5, "But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first."

Do you remember the day you became a Christian? How about the day you were baptized? Do you remember the joy and enthusiasm, the life and love that you had for the Savior? Has it waned in the work-life of your Christian walk? If so, take time to remember. Listen to those Christian songs that you heard at first. Re-read those passages again, slowly and thoughtfully, that brought you to deep communion with Jesus. Recall the great love you have for Jesus and be brought back in grateful repentance to the one who saved your soul.

Israel, in their war against the Philistines, suffered a great loss at the hands of their enemy. What was their solution? Bring out the ARK! Yes, that's it... the Ark of the Covenant of God remained behind in Shiloh and was brought up to the battlefield in order to defeat the Philistines.

However, there was just one problem (okay... there were many problems, but this one in particular), the Ark of God was not a talisman to be used as a means of some "magical" support from God. Here's what it said in 1 Samuel 4:3, "Why did the LORD bring defeat upon us today before the Philistines? Let us bring the Ark of the LORD's Covenant from Shiloh, so that it may go with us and save us from the hand of our enemies."

So that "IT" may save us? Really? It? Not "So that God may save us?" No, not that, we just need the Ark, we just need the talisman, we just need to look the part and then it all will happen automatically! What comes next is devastating. If they thought the battle had gone bad before, now it goes horrendously wrong.

But, my friends, don't we do the same today? Don't we simply bring out the functions of worship and the perfunctory expressions of devotion to God without any desire to seek the LORD? How many churches are missing the power of God in their great battles? How far down has our society declined in morality and virtue and the church seems powerless to change it? When was the last time someone said they had a great experience in the worship service and what they meant was a deep conviction of sin and a desperate desire to bring their lives into conformity with God and His word?

So, what do we do? We ramp up the volume and sing songs that drive the emotions so that people will have a great experience in church. We hype up the VBS and the children's programs so that it's more exciting for the kiddos and preach sermons that are more agreeable to the masses.We “bring out the ARK” and hide behind the talisman of religious expressionism, behind the bouncy-houses and baubles, the trinkets and tricks, and never truly seek the face of God. Let's face it - the prayer meeting is dull compared to the great performances happening on many Sunday mornings! But the power of God may just be found waiting for us in the prayer meeting.

While our sermons are preached and music is sung our communities fall prey to the steady encroachment of the enemy. Instead of the simple Gospel of Jesus Christ being the power of God for the salvation of all who believe (Romans 1:16) we now must make sure we are seen as "culturally relevant" despite the fact that the culture is lost and without hope in a wicked and depraved world. Evangelism becomes more about demographic research and market analysis rather than the proclamation and presentation of Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Even as Spurgeon said, “That very church which the world likes best is sure to be that which God abhors the most.”

Isn't it time that we begin to ask: "What does GOD want us to do?" Are we prepared to become so completely consecrated to the Lord Jesus that the very steps we take are ordered by the LORD?

There is an answer - and it took Israel 20 years to get to it.1 Samuel 7:2-4 speaks to this turn-around. In verse 3 we read, "And Samuel said to the whole house of Israel, 'If you are returning to the LORD with all your hearts, then rid yourselves of the foreign gods and the Ashtoreths and commit yourselves to the LORD and serve Him only, and He will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines.'"

The continual strengthening of the enemies of God in our culture and our communities comes from the willingness of God's people to put aside God's ways for worldly methods. But think about it this way: If imitation is the highest form of flattery, how long will churches across our land continue to flatter the world? We imitate the culture when we need to influence it. We entertain when we must entreat. We participate in programs and plans that have no touch of the direction of God because that's what we always do - we bring out the Ark - and hope that somehow God will be motivated to respond to our expectations.

The solution has already been given above. Return to the LORD with all your hearts and divest ourselves of all worldliness and religiosity that has no mark of the direction of God. I hope and pray it will not take another 20 years for us to get there.